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Phlem:(

fishingirl

Posts: 188
Joined: Nov 2009

Nov 22, 2009 - 6:14 pm

Hi Everybody! Hope everyone is on their way to wellness:( I have a question about spitting up phlem. I had my last radiation treatment 24 days ago, and I had not stopped spitting up phlem!!! It is constant. Does anyone have any idea how long this goes on for? It's one thing that is keeping me home. No one wants to hear and see someone honking and spitting. lol!!

... but the three to four weeks after treatment ends are the worst. The phlegm was awful for me for about four weeks, then started to slack off. After maybe eight weeks it was pretty much gone, or at least gone to the point where it wasn't too bothersome.
I'm now almost 14 months out, and the only phlegm issue I have is when I first get up in the morning. I gargle with Biotene, hack out whatever's down there and that's the end of it till the next morning.
Hang in there. Things will get better.

Thanks delnative! You made me feel better! I just joined this website, as I had NO ONE to talk to about my cancer. Of course I have a very supportive family, but it's still not the same as someone who has gone through the same thing. It feels so lonely sometimes.

Could I ask you another question? How long did it take you untill you could swallow food? I can swallow puddings and yogurt, but I just tried a tiny bit of scrambled egg, and I felt leary about it. I didn't choke....but something told me to not try any more. I might be trying too hard:)

My memory is getting a bit hazy as to exactly what happened when. (Hey, I'm 55. Cut me a break.)
I remember that for many weeks I existed on Cream of Wheat, various types of soups and soft-boiled or poached eggs.
I then got a little more adventurous. Because I live on the coast and seafood is readily available, I found that oysters (which I dearly love) and clams (ditto) slid down really well. I actually went out to the dock, met the workboat and bought a half-bushel of oysters, shucked 'em and made a big vat of oyster stew. I really jacked up the cream content because I needed the calories, and my oh my it was good. Of course, my arteries are still complaining, but that's another story.
After that I found I was able to deal with chicken, so long as it had some gravy or sauce to help grease the skids. Pasta went down well, too, but the homemade tomato sauce we'd canned from that year's garden was too spicy. (We'd spiced it up with our homegrown, nuclear-strength habanero peppers.)
Because I'm a deer hunter and always have a lot of venison in the freezer, I eventually tried to eat some of that. I found I needed steak sauce to help get it down, and I could only eat very small pieces, but things gradually improved from there.
Today I can eat everything I could eat B.C. (Before Cancer) my saliva is back almost 100 percent, and life is good.
Hang in there. You'll get better. It's a gradual process, but you'll get there.
Happy Thanksgiving!

Cindy, congratulations on your survivorship and welcome to CSN! As I have advised many another, it is a crummy club, due to the 'qualifications', but you will never find a kinder, gentler, more helpful group of people anywhere on the entire internet.

As to your question, there is no pat answer. As you may or may not know, radiation to the head/neck area may permanently adversely affect the salivary glands. If this is the case, the phlegm may never go away entirely.

On the other hand, many folks talk of recovering saliva in one or both glands over time, and/or of losing the phlegm action.

In my own case, I had surgery in October of 2005, followed by chemotherapy and rads, and even now, nearing the end of 2009, I still need, on occasion, to eject phlegm 'manually', by gargling water and sort of coughing it out.

The good news, at least for me, is that what started as a problem that woke me every two hours, literally: like clockwork! ... has become a more or less twice a day sort of thing, and something I could probably avoid altogether if I needed to.

What you need to remember right now is that your rads are more than likely still cooking and that some of the effects you are feeling now, including the abundance of phlegm, will very likely dissipate and even disappear as the rad action stops and its effects also then do the same.

Your treatment does not end, Cindy, when the treatments end :). They keep on doing their job for some time after.

Be patient, be strong, and stay hydrated. STAY HYDRATED.

You are on the road back and, again, I both congratulate you for that and welcome you here.

Thank you soooo much Joe. I have notice how generous and kind you are by reading some questions:) And you have answers! lol!! I have heard that the radiation continues after they have finished with you. I hate to say still cooking. Yuck! It reminds me of being microwaved. And here I ALWAYS stood away while it was on, just in case it gave cancer. lol! Anyway...I wouldn't mind it the phlegm was only a couple times of day. It's just this allll day long!! And me too, it wakes me up every couple of hrs.

When you say stay hydrated, do you mean only water, or does that include tea, and the odd cup of coffee? Water is so boring, but I'll do it:)

Do not accept this from me: see your doctors for clarification, but I believe that coffee is a diaruetic, meaning that it sort of compels urination, something you want to do of course, but not too often in a given day.

Water and tea are both good for you, of course, and OncoMan, when I indicated I was drinking sports drinks, suggested that I give them up for seltzer water...he said seltzer water was more hydrative (if that is a word) than even regular old water, for some reason I can no longer remember.

Always check with doc first, but I am fairly confident he or she will not begrudge you the occasional cup of coffee.

I responded to the other post, but on this subject, I can certainly relate. The doctor kept telling me to have patience today - this is a side effect of the radiation and it will get better, it will just take a long time. ( And a lot of stock in Puffs tissues) He said to drink plenty of water. We can compare notes weekly and see just how long a long time is! Dazey

My husband is 8 weeks out of treatment. He was constantly spitting too. But I would say for the last 2-3 weeks it has become sooooooo much better. He pretty much just gets his throat cleared in the morning upon getting up and he's good to go for the day. Mouth is still very dry, but atleast he's not honking up crap all day long. PK

lol!! I know what you mean! I was just out for a bit (having to pick up a few things at the pharmacy), and I forgot to bring tissues with me. Well? I glad I didn't choke...cuz I had to swallow it! lol!! Feeling better now that I'm home:)
Fishingirl

I am in my 7th week out and had bad mucus issues more during the last weeks of treatment and first few weeks post treatment but my Doctor (the Onc) gave me 'Fluimucil'. It comes in small sachets you mix with water and had an orange flavor. This helped to break up and release the mucus so sleeping was better and the mucus and phlem released easier.

There are other names for this product depending what country you are in but if you google it you will get the generic name and your Dr should also know it.

The actual description on the box says ' FLUIDIFICATION OF MUCOUS AND MUCOPURULENT SECRETIONS' so there you go.

I seem to be fairly clear now so rarely use it unless I feel blocked up in the evenings and then its a pre bed time thing.

One of the guys (Sach ?) mentioned in the thread to avoid 'Dairy' as that will also exacerbate the problem and cause mucous prodcution. I use Rice milk or Soy milk only now and organic if you can. Most supermarkets have it now.

Hope this helps. Hang in there. Week by week you notice improvement as I've learnt you can't measure day by day or you will go crazy so measure you recovery in bigger time frames like weeks. That has helped me a lot.

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